With Canadians living longer, the country’s pension landscape continuing to evolve and more private sector companies struggling to fund their defined benefit plans, governments across the country are reconsidering their regulations around pension solvency funding requirements. From coast to coast, here’s an update on the latest consultations and amendments. British Columbia In October 2018, the […]
Two organizations representing Canadian pensioners are asking the British Columbia government to reject the recommendations of a recent report by the Ministry of Finance that suggests lowering required pension solvency funding from 100 per cent to 85 per cent. “We actually disagreed with the very objective of the report,” says Marissa Lennox, spokesperson for CARP, formerly the […]
The Pension Investment Association of Canada is commending Nova Scotia on its proposed changes for improving the province’s pension funding framework. In a letter, the PIAC noted it supports the provision for statutory discharge following an annuity buyout, as well as the province’s move to to reduce the solvency threshold to 85 per cent and enhance pension plan […]
Canadian defined benefit pension plans maintained their solvency levels through the second quarter of 2019, according to Mercer’s latest pension health index. The index, which represents the solvency ratio of a hypothetical plan, reached 106 per cent as of June 30, 2019, an increase from 102 per cent at the year’s outset. The current solvency […]
The Pensions Policy Institute and U.K. consumer advocacy group Which? are teaming up to recommend to the U.K. government that working mothers should receive a top-up to their pensions in an effort to close the pension gender gap. The groups’ analysis found a woman in the U.K. who took time off for childcare responsibilities would put an average […]
Though Trish McAuliffe didn’t know much about pension benefits at the time, they were at the heart of one of her earliest working memories. In the 1980s, McAuliffe was a new employee at General Motors of Canada Co., putting together automobile interiors, when she dutifully joined the picket line during an eruption of labour strife […]
The number of women in Canadian registered pension plans reached a record high of 3.2 million as of January 2018, bringing them up to 50.5 per cent of plan members, according to new data from Statistics Canada. It also found the number of Canadians in registered pension plans surpassed 6.3 million in 2017, increasing by 62,800 members, […]
The market value of Canadian trusteed pension fund assets decreased by 1.3 per cent in Q4 2018 compared to the previous quarter, landing at $1.87 trillion. Yet, on a year-over-year basis, the market value of assets rose by 1.6 per cent compared to the fourth quarter of 2017. The strongest area of growth was mortgage […]
The Nova Scotia government is moving forward with changes to its regulatory framework for defined benefit pension plans. The province’s new framework follows a review launched in September 2017 and a summary of feedback released in April 2018. It’s still seeking input on technical issues, identified in the paper, in order to determine the best road forward […]
Since using a single benchmark portfolio to measure a pension plan’s funding status paints a narrow picture, a new report by PBI Actuaries and Consultants looked at four different portfolio types to see how the equity fall off at the end of the year, among other market events, affected different asset mixes. The liability portfolio kept […]